home is anything but sweet
by busy pushing up daisies
Summary: The air tastes of bitterness and smells like faded memories that just won't die. Loki is finally home.


-home is anything but sweet-

The air tastes of bitterness and smells like faded memories that just won't die. Loki is finally _home._

* * *

The flat even surface of a broken bridge feels good under Loki's feet and he tries not to smile (it hurts when he does). Thor walks silently behind him, brooding, fist tight around Loki's leash. There's nothing but the sound of a pair of feet silently treading along broken glass and another practically stomping his way through.

Careful, brother, you might disturb a deaf man with all your stampeding, Loki would say if he hadn't a cage for a mouth and a guard for a brother, but he does and dreams are for weaker men, anyways.

"Brother," Thor starts and his speech falters and so do his steps, Loki stops so the chain won't yank him back.

"Brother," he tries again, "I know not of the phantom plaguing your mind, but I insist that you ignore it when you see Father, again."

Loki closes his eyes with a sense of resignation and thinks, and people answer to the likes of you. He pictures a small band of petty humans and wonders why Thor's choice in company has sunken so low.

Warm hands weight on his shoulders and Loki opens his eyes to an uncomfortable blue –he will never tell anyone, but blue used to be his favorite color, after the putrid sky, the waves fuming at his feet, and a brother's blue blue eyes, but blue resembles so much more- and gods he hates the blue.

"I will vouch for you, Loki; your time on Earth has changed you for the better." Thor attempts a smile.

I've killed 43 people- no not people, humans- in 2 days, give or take a few. And I liked it, Loki wants to sneer when all he needs is to cry, and I wouldn't take it back for anything.

Not for your love, or _mother_, or_ just a little name, just a little, Odinson. _

Thor looks away from Loki's face and they continue to walk. Already, he can see the towering building of magnificent architect and his skin crawls.

Nobody's around, Loki notes bitterly, not to see the homecoming of a man once prince (but don't you realize it, Loki? They never thought of you as their prince. Just a boy with a name, and nothing else.) They pass silent buildings and vaguely Loki wonders if Thor ordered them away. For the sake of Loki's dignity or something else.

They pass a tall skeletal tree.

_Loki? Brother where are you? Someone shouts from below Loki's dangling feet. He sighs, exasperasted and looks below, placing his harried book aside._

_What, Thor? He says with annoyed indignation._

_Thought you were up there, Thor grins and beckons him down, hurry Father's calling for us!_

The air tastes of bitterness and smells like faded memories that just won't die. Loki is finally _home._

…

They throw him in a little cell in a pit of a mountain.

"I hope this will teach you a lesson," Odin says and nothing more. Nothing more.

Is that all I am to you? Just another little problem that needs to be corrected before the civilians complain.

No one comes, not even guards. They whisper about a demented voice and Loki swallows his sharp retorts. Food magics itself onto his bench of a bed three times everyday. It is delicious food, probably from the royal table itself. But Loki will _not_ eat leftovers. He will not.

He resists the temptation as dishes pile itself atop each other, almost collapsing on the stone cold bench. He thinks he might actually die of this- but he chose it, and choosing is so much different- of this torturing thing called starvation. Arms curling around his abdomen and eyelids against the concrete.

Footsteps echo down the hallway. Loud voices. A slam. Familiar shouts.

The cage slides open, and he's done it! He's done it, they've let their guard down, he'll escape, and then it's good bye Midgard and maybe goodbye Asgard(you'll hesitate again, you always will). But he's just so tired and it feels like his stomach is digesting itself, and someone's mumbling sorry over and over. Shoves a spoon of something so horrid and beautiful in his mouth that he stumbles and spits it out.

"No," Loki says weakly to a man that won't listen- blue blue eyes-, "You don't understand, it's a" his tongue slips on plan as if his mind understands that that information will only bring trouble before his heart does.

"Sorry," the man says again, "the guards wouldn't let me, and _Father" _blue eyes says the name with so much poison Loki almost flinches when he should only be smiling mockingly. Good old Thor, blaming others- and Loki thinks what his mouth won't say, it runs in the family, Odin, Frigga, and maybe even Loki, who blames Thor more than anything when he's only brought it on himself, but Loki's not a family so he keeps his mouth shut-.

And ever so slowly, paincreasingly so, Loki heals. Thor makes a trip everyday which decreases to every other day until it's only the weekends. Just to make sure his little brother is safe (he has Midgard to worry about , now).

Loki eats, only so an embarrassing incident like that won't happen again. The guards still don't come, and Loki is grateful. Ever so slowly, when the Midgardians- the _Avengers_ and that _woman_, he almost spits out- have decayed and the humans have destroyed themselves so Loki doesn't have to, Loki will gather strength. The earth will hum beneath his fingertips and Asgard will be nothing but a broken home.(Again you will hesitate, like you always do, but it's okay, it's because you own a heart, and with a heart comes the necessary bearings, like worthless feeling and sharp memories that just won't die).

Loki sits in his cell, eyes closed, head resting against the rough uneven wall and doesn't dream about old memories and could have beens, because dreams are for weaker men and Loki is anything but weak.

Home is anything but sweet.

But that's okay, Loki thinks with ironic amusement, Loki despises sweet things.

(You will hesitate- of blue blue eyes and apologies that ring in your ears, forever- but you won't stop. dreams are for weaker men, and Asgard is prettier burning.)

* * *

**A/N:** Hi, thanks for reading! Just thumbing through my old journal when I saw this so decided to type it up and post it. Hope you liked it! Review if you liked it, review if you don't. I'd really appreciate it! :)


End file.
